


holding out for a bright purple hero

by WingsOfTime



Series: in another time [2]
Category: Final Fantasy XIV
Genre: Anal Sex, Intersex Character, Oral Sex, Other, Pegging, Penetrative Sex, please don't be weird about that
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-11-29
Updated: 2018-11-29
Packaged: 2019-09-02 10:24:39
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,954
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16785073
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/WingsOfTime/pseuds/WingsOfTime
Summary: A chat is due, and ends maybe a long time later.(can be read as a sequel tothe consequences of fashion)





	holding out for a bright purple hero

**Author's Note:**

> never ask me for anything ever again hskdjfhsf

Thancred stands in his doorframe—leans, more specifically, with an ease borne of both practice and a gracefully casual manner he breathes and lives in. It is an art, in his opinion, to look as if one is not at all trying when one is, in fact, trying very hard.

Not that he is, of course. It is an easy thing, an easy dance, to tread softly into the intimate territory of another person. Ikael, for his part, looks like simply standing there awkwardly is incredibly difficult for him, what with the way he is shifting his weight and looking around and letting his tray of snacks slide slowly and perilously to the right.

“I brought grapes,” he pipes up, sounding a lot less awkward than he looks. “Are you going to let me in, or are you going to keep staring at me in silence?”

… Alright. Thancred is, perhaps, trying a _smidgen_ too hard. He steps back with a deep, wordless nod, and Ikael gives him a strange look before coming inside and closing the door.

“Is something wrong with your voice?” he inquires as he sets the tray down on Thancred's desk. He seats himself at it as well, swinging his legs up next to a small stack of books. “Are you ill? Do you want me to make you tea? You know, ginger lemon tea is very good for sore throats!”

Thancred cannot help himself. “And how would you know _that_?” he asks smugly, hoisting himself onto his bed.

“If your throat hurts because you stuffed a cock down your esophagus, then tea will not help!” Ikael advises him.

Thancred playfully scowls at having his fun stolen. “Alright, you disgusting little alley cat,” he says, admittedly a little bit proud. “Now, what brings you to my humble little room this evening?”

He asks as if they had not arranged to have this meeting. Ikael looks at him for a long moment, and his expression melts into something quiet and serious. His tail curls up, flicking against the desk chair.

“You said,” he says simply, “that we would talk.”

 _You said._ That is it. Not “you promised,” or “I want to,” or “I really _don’t_ want to, but we have to.” Just… “you said.” No accusation, no hesitation.

Thancred is struck by a sudden pulse of affection, and he smiles from it, expression unwittingly softening. Ikael smiles back, his gaze also easing into surprised tenderness.

“So,” Thancred says, reaching past Ikael’s ankle to snag a grape (a significant number of which seem to be missing). His wrist rests against warm skin as he plucks it off, then withdraws. “Do you wish to begin, or shall I?”

Ikael moves his legs off the desk and pulls the tray closer. He gets up, sitting next to Thancred on the bed.

“Can I sit near you?” he asks softly, eyes worried.

Thancred reaches for him, tugs him close until their thighs are touching. “Yes,” he replies, keeping his arm around Ikael’s back. “Do not tell me you are suddenly giving thought to my personal space?”

Ikael smiles, chuckles a little. “I don’t know,” he says. “Usually when I am with a man… well, it’s fucking or nothing, you know?”

That triggers a scowl in Thancred's chest, one that twinges its way to his mouth. “Then they are shite men,” he says sharply. He cannot help the angle of his voice—he does not like the thought of someone he cares about being treated like something to either be used or discarded.

“I am speaking only of casual arrangements, Thancred,” Ikael murmurs, voice lifting. “I am never friends with any of them. I… would not be able to handle that. And now… there is you.”

Thancred turns his head, frowning in thought. His lips are close to Ikael’s neck—he gets an idle thought to kiss it, but brushes it off. Now is not the time.

“And now there is me,” he mulls, turning the words over. He shoots Ikael a small smile. “Well. If this is something that we both desire to pursue—and right now I will say, for the sake of candor, that yes, I do—then I would wish to do so with all the respect we both deserve.”

That is how he always conducts himself during his own encounters, and that is how he wishes to do so this time. Ikael nods, looking as if he is slowly processing, and eventually glances up.

“And if it becomes something... more?” he says, voice quiet.

Thancred tilts his chin up a fraction, meeting his gaze. "Are you afraid it might?" he asks bluntly.

Ikael's eyelashes lower, and then he shrugs, and slowly nods. Thancred gives a considering hum.

"Then we shall see," he says finally. "In any case, you mean far too much to me for me to even consider dropping our entire friendship because of this. I can promise you, Ikael, that we will never lose what we have."

Ikael looks back up, abrupt. "You can't know that," he murmurs.

"I can." Thancred's voice is firm. Of this, he is certain. "It is all on us, don't you realize? If I do not wish to cut myself off, and you do not wish to, then we will not. And if one of us does eventually feel like it is becoming something… more, as you put it? Then I am open to the possibility of... exploring that."

Ikael's eyes turn wet. "Thancred," he mutters, soft and awed.

"Don't get all mushy on me," Thancred tells him.

"You want to have babies with me," Ikael says in a choked voice, smiling.

Thancred jerks himself back by an instinctive fulm. "Wh—Menphina, no—is that even—"

"Little monstrous half-kitten babies that will wish they never existed," Ikael coos, clinging onto him. “Oh, _Thancred—_ ”

“Do not joke around about that, you wretched little voidsent,” Thancred says, agitating his arms to dislodge Ikael (to no avail; his grip is like a vice). “Can you even _get_ pregnant?”

He is fairly certain Ikael once told him he could not, but he would like to know. He would _very much_ like to know, the possibility of miqo’te-hyuran mixed children unlikely as it may be.

Ikael laughs, finally letting him go. “No,” he says through a chuckle. “Although you should have seen the look on your face just now. Anyways! I am glad we did this.” He gets up, gives Thancred a gleaming grin. “Thanks for the chat!”

“Wait.” Thancred rises as well. “You are simply… leaving?”

“Mhm?” Ikael blinks innocently at him. “Whatever else would I be doing?”

Thancred steps into Ikael’s personal space, looking down— _Exactly three ilms, Thancred,_ an annoying Ikael-like voice says in his head—into Ikael's amused gaze.

“I do not know,” he says. “Perhaps staying for a bit longer, if you wish.”

Thancred has—well. Thancred has _prepared_ , to put it mildly. It would be unfortunate if his efforts were to go to waste. It would be doubly unfortunate if he cannot seduce _Ikael_ of all people into his bed.

“You want me to stay?” Ikael asks in the same innocent tone, although Thancred now notices its mildly mocking edge. “Me, the _wretched_ little voidsent?”

“Come now,” Thancred murmurs, trailing his fingers up Ikael’s bare arm. “I was merely speaking in jest. If you wish to leave then you may, of course, but I daresay a bed is warmer with two people in it.”

“But it is _evening_ ,” Ikael wheedles, apparently still adamant on playing his ridiculous little role. Thancred grunts. “Why would I want to sleep so _early?_ ”

He bats his eyelashes. Thancred, unimpressed, flicks him on the shoulder.

“Ow!” Ikael shoots him a reproachful glance, rubbing where he has been flicked. Thancred crosses his arms.

“We did theater together, once,” he says. Unfortunately, he still remembers. “You are still terrible at acting.”

“Okay, _fine._ ” Ikael sighs. “So, Mister Grumpypants Rogue wants to fuck, huh?”

“Mister Grumpypants Rogue noticed the way,” Thancred says, touching the back of his hand to Ikael’s neck and slowly dragging it upwards. Ikael swallows. “You reacted when he did this thirty seconds ago.”

“Speaking about yourself in the third person is unse—unsexy,” Ikael says as Thancred's hand keeps moving, tipping his neck up, curling around his jaw. He swallows again. “A-and you need all the… you need all the sexiness you can get, because you def—definitely don’t… um—”

Thancred leans forward to press a kiss to his throat. “Mmhm?” he encourages, because Ikael has gone silent.

“Oh, who am I kidding,” Ikael mumbles in a hoarse undertone.

Thancred grins, and moves up to slide his mouth over Ikael’s. He tastes familiar, now, and also like grapes (so that’s where the other half had gone). Thancred gently sucks on his tongue, and Ikael wraps his arms around Thancred's shoulders and hooks a leg around his hip.

“Fuck me, pretty man, yeah?” he mutters against Thancred's lips. Thancred runs a hand past his arse, down the thigh wrapped snug around his own, holds him steady. He kisses Ikael again, deeply, and surely enough, Ikael’s grip starts to loosen.

“Is that how it goes in your mind, hm?” Thancred murmurs. He angles his leg between both of Ikael’s, pulling himself closer, and Ikael makes a short, breathless noise. “You want me to _fuck_ you. Last time, too, you were… very direct.”

“Well,” Ikael gasps, rolling his hips slowly, “That’s generally how it goes, equipment-wise. Unless you want me to get _mine_ , which is in my room. But I doubt that. Besides, I cleaned myself for this.”

Thancred pauses. The hand he has on Ikael’s back scratches for a moment before pulling him closer.

“I did, too,” he confesses.

Ikael stops moving—mostly—and looks at him. His eyebrows slowly arch upwards. “You _did_ ,” he repeats, something interested entering his tone.

Thancred gives a loose shrug. “I usually do, if I have something planned,” he says. Ikael’s eyes are locked onto his, intelligent and bright. “But such preparation, more often than not, goes unneeded.”

Ikael tilts his head slightly. “How long?” he questions.

“How long since I have slept with a man? How long since I’ve received, rather than given?” Thancred shrugs once more. “Not that long, not counting yourself, and… a while. Respectively.”

“ _Well_.” Ikael’s voice is low. “Hopefully we can top up both of those lists tonight.”

Thancred feels a thrill pass through him at that, and moves to kiss Ikael once more, renewing the motion between them. Ikael moans softly, shifting his leg. Thancred inhales, sharp, when the movement grinds them together.

“I _do_ want to be inside you, however,” he mutters against Ikael’s jaw, pressing himself closer. “If you are amenable to that.”

“Oh, most definitely,” Ikael agrees. He swings his other leg up so that he is straddling Thancred's hips, and cheerfully grinds while Thancred stumbles, then steadies himself with a hand against the wall.

He moves them to the bed, setting Ikael down gently first before joining him. Ikael slides his hands up Thancred's shirt as soon as he is able; not lifting, simply feeling. Thancred pauses and tilts his head, amused.

“If you want to look as well as touch,” he says, “This is very easy to take off. Doesn’t even have buttons, let alone seven unnecessary belts.”

“In mocking me, you mock yourself,” Ikael declares self-righteously. He tosses his head. Thancred leans forwards as Ikael keeps feeling him up, apparently content in that activity, and tugs at his tight black tunic.

“Lift your arms,” he says.

Ikael pouts. “No-o-o,” he says back. He presses his fingers into Thancred's chest, as if to make a point.

“Do you want me to cut this off?” Thancred threatens, mostly in jest.

Mostly.

Ikael squints it him as if to gauge his seriousness, then slowly withdraws and takes his own tunic off. Thancred kisses his chest in reward as he tosses it aside.

“Thank you, love,” he says, moving down Ikael’s abdomen. He pauses at the resulting giggle, then keeps going, hooking his fingers in the waistband of Ikael’s leggings and pulling them down.

His next pause is significantly longer. “Ikael,” he says.

“Heehee—your hair is tickly,” Ikael says back.

“Do you usually go around without smalls?” Thancred asks sarcastically as Ikael pushes his leggings off himself with his toes, flinging them with wild glee. “Or is it just for special occasions?”

Ikael makes a considering noise, then abruptly moves forwards—and is suddenly sitting atop Thancred's thighs, nosing at his jaw.

“I don’t think I’m the only one, hm?” he mutters, sucking at a spot behind Thancred's jaw as his hand rubs between his legs.

Thancred has to take a moment to collect himself—he had not been expecting the rush of movement—and when he finally gathers his thoughts, he licks his lips and opens his mouth to speak—

Ikael kisses him before he gets the chance, moving his hand in a slow, continuous squeezing motion. Thancred gasps, which seems to only encourage him—the kiss deepens, and Thancred's mind blanks, the edges of it scattering into numb sparks.

Ikael’s hand shifts off of him for a moment, doing something that Thancred cannot quite catch in his current state, and he breaks the kiss to lick his palm. Thancred blinks rapidly, a few scattered fragments of thought connecting, and he has enough presence of mind to realize what is going on a second before Ikael’s hand closes around his cock.

He exhales in a stutter, chest moving in time with the rhythm of Ikael’s hand. Ikael coos at him, a lower and softer noise than his usual one, and kisses the corner of Thancred's mouth.

“You feel so pretty,” he murmurs, either nonsensical or sensical enough that Thancred can somehow find meaning in what he is saying. Ikael leans their foreheads together. “I like the way you breathe. With your whole body, like you are alive in all of it.”

“Thanks,” Thancred mutters, not knowing what else to say, and not aware enough of himself to make light. Ikael smiles at him, all warm, and lets go of him.

He undresses Thancred quickly, helped by Thancred himself only a beat later. By now he is back in a mindset he knows, and he carefully lowers himself on top of Ikael once only their bare skin is touching.

Ikael spreads his legs as Thancred sweeps a hand up his thigh. “Do you want me to go first?” he mumbles, head lolling to the side. His tail curls as well, an involuntary mirror. Thancred wonders if it signifies anything.

“It is your body,” he replies, dragging his thumb over the tendon of Ikael’s inner thigh. It earns him a small noise and a minute widening of his legs. “Do you want me to take you?”

A strange question, perhaps. The way Ikael is looking at him—pupils blown wide enough to pass as his sister tribe, cheeks and chest flushed, body readily responding to him—is what would normally be understood as easy willfulness; eagerness, even. But Thancred has not failed to notice that he uses _fuck_ instead of any other word, that he is quick to escalate and slow to dawdle, that his very understanding of the act, perhaps, is drenched in intense physical encounters and rushed meetings.

Ikael blinks at him. “Yeah,” he says, voice scratchy as gravel. He swallows, looking around. “You _do_ have lubricant somewhere here, do you not? I didn’t prepare _that_ much.”

“Yes,” Thancred replies, pleased. He shifts his weight to one arm as he rifles in his bedside drawer, closing his fingers around the small tin and snapping it open. He sits up as he takes some onto his fingers, setting it aside for later.

“I can do it,” Ikael offers, sounding a little surprised. Thancred shoots him a low grin—notices with some delight how Ikael’s breath stutters at it.

“I want to open you up,” Thancred mutters, leaning down to see better. Ikael helpfully bends his knees. “Slowly, if I may.”

“It’s your cock,” Ikael says, sounding a bit bemused, but still agreeable.

Thancred chuckles a little. “It’s _our_ cock,” he jokes nonsensically, and Ikael snorts out a giggle.

“Our one and only real cock,” he agrees, staring at the ceiling as Thancred bends down. Thancred drags the flat of his tongue over his sex. “We can… a-ah—"

“Easy does it,” Thancred murmurs, circling his lower entrance with his forefinger as he licks again. Ikael makes a confused but distracted noise, legs twitching.

“What are you… trying to accomplish here?” he mumbles. Thancred sucks gently at his clit and then slowly breaches him with his finger. Ikael jumps a little.

“What you might expect,” Thancred replies, moving his mouth off of Ikael briefly to speak before putting it back. He works his tongue in slow, deep drags, keeping pace with his finger. Ikael doesn’t seem to know how to react, tossing about a bit but not commenting. _Certainly_ not complaining, if the little noises that are going directly to Thancred's cock are any indication.

Thancred adds a second finger when the motion becomes easy—and when Ikael starts to tilt his hips impatiently.

“I wonder,” he muses as he works, looking down at Ikael lying breathless before him. He is breathing rapidly, and the flush on his chest has deepened, tinging his skin a lovely pinkish hue. He keeps making these small—twitches, little flickers of responsive movement to Thancred's ministrations. “Do you have…?”

A crook of his fingers answers that question. Ikael moans breathily, hips canting upwards. Thancred tilts his head, somewhat curious despite himself. But anatomical inquisitions tend to ruin sexual encounters, so he shelves his questions until later.

Ikael mumbles something, face turned nearly into the bed. Thancred makes a questioning noise.

“What was that? Sorry.”

Ikael swallows, licks his lips, and his gaze wanders about the room before meeting Thancred's. “More, please,” he mumbles.

 _That_ sends a spark of heat dancing up Thancred's spine. He bends down, inserts a third finger, and seals his mouth over Ikael’s sex as he moves his hand at a steadily increasing pace. Ikael moans loudly, arching upwards. His legs widen even further, at a flexibility that even Thancred cannot hope to replicate, and Thancred makes a noise of encouragement.

 _Come on, come on, come on_ , he thinks at Ikael, since his mouth is busy. He moves faster, twisting his fingers further, arching his tongue _just_ so, and Ikael cries out, jerking harshly against him. He clenches—oh, Menphina— _tightly_ around Thancred's fingers, and Thancred swallows around a dry throat.

He eases off of Ikael as he calms down, not wanting to overstimulate, and wets his fingers once more with lubricant before wrapping them around his length. When he looks back, Ikael is staring at him, legs splayed out.

“You’re so…” Ikael mutters, and does not finish the thought. Thancred flashes him a charming grin, hoping it does not look _too_ desperate, and waits, staying his hand.

“Just…” Ikael pulls his legs _up_ , exposing himself, and Thancred feels the heated curl of arousal deep in his stomach tighten further. “Fuck me, for gods’ sake.”

“With pleasure,” Thancred answers roughly, because he can do _that_ , yes, please.

He angles himself and pushes in, and then Ikael locks his legs around his waist and they are lost in the heat of bodies and sweat and skin. Thancred is not moving slowly anymore, but Ikael is only encouraging his pace, making sweet little noises and pushing himself up into him. This, Thancred knows how to do. To angle the roll of his hips to snap them just so, to respond to the person he is making love to, adjust to both their pleasure and his.

 _Old and reliable_ , Thancred thinks hazily. Just like him.

Ikael’s cries turn ragged and desperate, and Thancred catches the hand that drifts down towards his sex and replaces it with his own, rubbing rapidly against his clit without cease. Ikael’s voice shoots up in pitch, into something light and airy that would guarantee him a good career as a singer, and he arches in a truly impressive manner before— _oh—_ the _clenching_ —Thancred's thrusts speed up before his orgasm hits him as well, and his hips stutter mindlessly into tight, all-encompassing heat.

He pulls out when he gets the urge to collapse on top of Ikael, and rolls to his side instead. Ikael is grinning at him, eyes half-lidded, chest rising and falling rapidly.

“You’re…” he mutters. He closes his eyes, laughs a little before opening them.

“Perfect,” he finishes smugly. He leans in to kiss Thancred.

~*~

“I think your standards are just terribly low,” Thancred says when they break apart. Ikael takes a deep breath, blows it out with puffed cheeks.

“… Maybe,” he admits after a moment. “’s still nice, though. We should keep doing this, I think.”

Thancred quirks an eyebrow. “ _Do_ you?” he says. Ikael laughs.

“In general, I mean,” he clarifies unnecessarily, and Thancred is about to frown in confusion before Ikael sits up. “Although you are right; I shall go fetch my cock now. Let’s see just how long you can last, yeah?”

Thancred blinks. “You want to go… again?” he asks, throat suddenly dry.

It is Ikael’s turn to raise his eyebrow. “Whatever is the matter?” he says. He runs a finger up Thancred's member, earning a shiver. “Not up for it?”

Thancred feels himself flush lightly. “Give me five minutes,” he says, because he needs at least one to calm down. He rolls onto his back, slowing his breathing.

“Thancred.” Ikael leans over him, filling his vision. Thancred blinks a few times, slowly.

“If you do not feel comfortable doing this, then you don’t have to,” Ikael says, soft and sincere. “I understand there is some sort of… mentality that a lot of men have. That giving, somehow, is less… demeaning, perhaps, than—”

“It is definitely not that.” Thancred cuts him off with a sharp shake of his head. Ikael draws back, brow furrowing in concern, and Thancred sits up so they can speak properly.

“That mindset is… harmful, to not just the ones that have it. And if you think,” he adds as realization sparks in his mind, “that ‘a lot of men’ have it, then I will admit I find myself even less… elated with the people you’ve been sleeping with than I was before. But that is a discussion for another time, if at all.”

Something in Ikael’s face melts a little—something affectionate, stuck in his gaze like sticky-sweet candy. “Okay, Thancred,” he says softly.

Thancred gives a nod, pushes the thought aside to focus on later. “It has just… been a while, really,” he says. He licks his lips. “I cannot say that the thought does not… excite me.”

Ikael looks at him curiously, head cocked and ears perked up, and Thancred lets himself be studied, staring back. Ikael starts to smile.

“Do you want me to fuck you, hm?” he says, eyelids drooping. His tail curls up behind him before flicking to the side. “So hard you can feel it in the morning?”

Thancred swallows, feeling a quiver of anticipation stutter his heartbeat. Ikael is projecting a… strange, casual presence that is bafflingly at odds with the soft neediness he displayed only minutes prior. Thancred rolls his shoulders in a shrug, resting back against the bed.

“It is either that or you make me talk about my feelings for a bell or two more,” he says, pretending as if the heat of arousal coiling low in his gut is barely a thing to be concerned about. “And _that_ would be truly insufferable.”

Ikael barks out a laugh. “Very well, then,” he says with a smile. He slips off the bed, bending down as he searches for his leggings. Thancred appreciates the view with lowered lids.

Ikael straightens up while tugging his leggings on, not bothering to thread his tail through the hole. “I’ll be back in a minute, yeah?” he says. He tilts his head, then quickly scrambles over to give Thancred a kiss before giggling and darting out the room.

Ikael comes back with a cheery bounce in his step. He is holding a—good gods—Thancred sits up with a start. A bright— _bright—_ purple phallus, attached to what looks like a soft leather harness.

“Were you just,” Thancred says uselessly, as Ikael chirps at him and kicks off his leggings before trotting over, “swinging that around for everyone to see?”

“Hm. Shtola is blind, I think,” Ikael informs him. Thancred groans, loud and long. Not in the way that he would like to, unfortunately, since the thought of _Y'shtola_ spotting Ikael is more than enough to make him wilt.

“She was supportive!” Ikael says happily, swinging the phallus around his hand like it is a toy. “Said to wish you good luck.”

“ _Please_ stop talking about Y'shtola,” Thancred begs.

“She is very important to me!” Ikael insists as Thancred continues to die inside. “She is my friend! I lo—I love—her very much!”

“I do not doubt that,” Thancred soothes, since he cannot tell how high the possibility of Ikael getting genuinely upset that Thancred does not want him to talk about Y'shtola when they are trying to have sex is. “Put your… put that thing on. You can tell Y'shtola—” He is going to regret this. He _is_. “—about it afterwards, alright?”

Ikael seems to consider this as a valid suggestion. Thancred sends a quick prayer to Hydaelyn, who must be listening, because then he smiles and nods.

“It has ridges? Yeah?” He juts his pelvis out for Thancred to see as he adjusts the harness. “Feels nice.”

Thancred traces the pattern on the phallus with a curious finger. It does indeed have ridges, and a somewhat flared head that curves a bit unnaturally, but piques his interest.

He curls a hand around it, stroking a few times. He glances up at Ikael, who is studying him closely.

“Does this somehow feed back to you?” Thancred asks. Ikael shakes his head.

“No,” he says. “It is not magic—simply manmade. But it does not overly matter.” He grins, sharp. “I get to fuck you with it either way, yeah?”

And just like that, the mood in the room shifts into something low and heated. Ikael crawls onto the bed, settling over him.

Thancred tilts his head up for a kiss, and Ikael meets him halfway, steady and surprisingly forceful. Thancred moans softly, lets strong hands push him down onto the mattress.

“So how do you want it, hm?” Ikael questions. A thumb circles over Thancred's nipple, toying, and Thancred is breathing fast and on his way to being hard again. “Hard? Fast? Slow and steady?”

“Hard,” Thancred grits out, raking his nails down Ikael’s back, which arches. “And fast.”

Ikael takes a second to answer. He shifts, and Thancred feels a hot dampness on his thigh below the coolness of the phallus, leaving for a moment before touching down again, staying.

“Good,” Ikael says quietly. “Then we are of one mind.”

The energy between them spikes, thudding like a heartbeat, purpose in a pulse. Ikael bites at his clavicle, Thancred hisses, digs his nails in again. He opens his legs to wedge open Ikael’s, and Ikael gasps and stumbles. But before Thancred can reach to feel that dampness for himself, a hand closes around his member. Quick, calloused fingers work around him, a thumb swiping underneath the head and then over, another hand somehow reaching down to cup his sac and squeeze gently, fondling. Thancred gasps, dropping back down on the bed. The hand on his cock moves lower, only to make room for warm, wet suction and a tongue rapidly flicking against the sensitive spot on the underside.

“I thought we were going to—” Thancred tries speaking up after this does not cease for a significant amount of time. He sounds garbled even to himself. He moans, tries again. “I’m really… not going to last if you—”

All of a sudden, all sensation is gone, and Thancred lets out a low grunt of disappointment despite himself. He braces his elbows on the bed to look up, dizzy, and sees Ikael reaching for the tin of lubricant.

“You tell me if I hurt you, okay?” Ikael pauses in his task to lock eyes with him. “I’m serious, Thancred. Please.”

“Only the good kind of pain, got it,” Thancred jokes. Ikael only frowns at him, infuriatingly worried, and Thancred sighs.

“Alright,” he acquiesces. “I will.”

Ikael smiles at him, gradual and bright as the swivving sun peeking out from behind a cloud, and Thancred finds himself smiling back.

Ikael sits back on his haunches, giving room for them to move. “Hands and knees,” he requests. Thancred raises a cheeky eyebrow, but dutifully flips himself around, settling himself as comfortably as he can. He feels a hand splay over his arse, and then another one, and they simply stay like that. Squeeze.

“If you are quite satisfied,” Thancred says after an amusing minute of inaction, “I _would_ like to continue with the main event.”

“You know what was… good?” Ikael questions the air, moving his fondling hands down Thancred's thighs, “When you said _fuck_. I liked it. Like you stopped pretending that you were any less lewd than the rest of us. And I _know_ how you can _be._ ”

“If you want to fuck me,” Thancred rephrases, “It’s not going to happen while that purple monstrosity of yours is anywhere but in my arse.”

Apparently _that_ is direct enough for Ikael’s breath to hitch, for his nails to dig into Thancred's flesh. Something behind Thancred shifts, and then he feels a probing at his entrance.

“I just want to—feel,” Ikael defends as he slowly works his finger inside. Thancred closes his eyes, unused to the sensation being caused by someone other than himself, after all this time. It has been… gods, since before that fateful banquet, he thinks. Far too long.

Either Ikael notices how still he is holding himself, or he simply has a more elaborate plan of action, because a warm, slick hand closes around Thancred's cock and starts to stroke. He feels breath on his thigh, followed by a mouth slowly sucking the delicate skin at the junction of his legs.

“Do you know why I have this?” Ikael breathes as Thancred tries to let the gradual drag of pleasure sweep over any uncomfortableness he is feeling. “I met someone, once. Like me, except… all the way, yeah? And he fucked me with a false cock better than any man ever had with a real one.”

His mouth returns to Thancred's inner thigh, biting down gently—Thancred's toes curl—before sucking, kissing.

“And then he let me do it to him, too,” Ikael continues. “And I _liked_ it. I couldn’t feel anything, but I _knew_ that he felt… _everything_ that I was doing. And I could keep going, for as long as I wanted. I would make him come and then I would stay inside him and then I would fuck him again. And again.”

He adds a second finger. Thancred finds his voice somewhere in the depths of his throat, deep and scratchy, and says, “I fear that even I do not… quite have that sort of stamina.”

Ikael makes a considering noise. Then the hand around Thancred suddenly speeds up, as does his fingers. _Hard and fast_ , Thancred remembers, even as he gasps raggedly. He could ask Ikael to stop, to slow down, but his cock has been aching and this feels _so good_ and—Thancred moans.

“How does this feel, hm?” Ikael asks, as if his twisting fingers are not slowly driving Thancred to insanity. “Do you want more, darling?”

“Ikael—” Thancred groans as Ikael’s strokes speed up, threatening to make him spill over his bedsheets. “I—fuck...”

“Is that a yes?” The hand around him suddenly vanishes, making Thancred whimper involuntarily. Another finger slides into him, and he rocks back into it, eagerness getting the better of his pride until he can gather enough of himself to recover.

When he does, it is to fist his hands in the sheets and flash Ikael a sharp, breathless grin. “You’re a kinky bastard, aren’t you?”

Ikael smiles at him, and presses his fingers harshly against Thancred's sweet spot. Thancred gasps again, clenching around the sensation.

“Do you want me to keep doing this?” Ikael asks, soft as spun sugar. A hand strokes down Thancred's thigh. “Hm? I think it’s fun, touching you.”

His gentle words are at odds with the fast pace of his fingers, fucking into Thancred without cease or thought for mercy. Thancred makes a garbled noise in reply, dropping his head, and Ikael laughs.

A hand closes around his length again, once more speeding up until Thancred feels as if he is going to burst, and then mysteriously vanishing. Thancred is… having quite enough of that, he thinks, even as he rocks back mindlessly against Ikael’s fingers. Time for… more. Yes.

“Why are you talking,” he grits out, “When you could be fucking me, hm? Rather…” He pauses to pant. “… inconsiderate of you.”

“‘ _Rather_ inconsiderate,’” Ikael repeats, and Thancred gets the distinct feeling he is being mocked. He does not get the chance to react, however, because those delightful, twisting fingers inside him suddenly retreat. He arches back with a quiet whine, confused.

“Stay still, you whiny arse,” Ikael tells him, placing a steadying hand on his back. “Unless you want me to accidentally neuter you. Now…”

And then he is finally— _finally—_ pushing inside, and Thancred groans, low in his throat. He pushes back, eager to take the most welcome intrusion, and Ikael makes a soft noise at him, splaying his hand over his arse and squeezing gently.

“Move your legs,” he says conversationally.

… What? Thancred blinks rapidly, mind not quite catching up, and shifts his calf in a half-hearted attempt to show that he is paying attention.

Ikael tuts at him, slow and soft, and really, Thancred should know by now that that tone is a warning. His thighs are grabbed, suddenly, in a strong grip. Thancred chokes in surprise as his legs are pushed down into the bed, wedged apart and held in place. A warm body drapes itself over his back, and Thancred feels hot breath between his shoulder blades.

“It is good for me, like this,” Ikael’s voice supplies, close to his skin. Thancred feels a soft press of lips. “I can make you _feel_.”

Thancred is barely given a chance to ask what he means, and then Ikael pulls his hips back and _snaps_ forwards, and Thancred feels pleasure skitter up his spine and seep into his core. Ikael does it again, then again, and begins to set a truly ruthless pace, and Thancred can do nothing but fail to catch his breath and hold on.

He must look ridiculous like this, he muses somewhat hysterically as Ikael relentlessly drives into him. Spread apart, held down, and fucked into like he is some sort of… strange, lifelike sex toy. But he is _not_ a toy—last time he checked he was fairly alive—and Ikael isn’t even doing this for his own pleasure. Well… not in a way that Thancred can relate to, at least. Somehow, that thought spurns him on even further, mingling with the pleasure dancing through his veins, augmenting it.

Ikael presses his hands to Thancred's back, moves faster, pushes him down. Wedges his legs apart further, too, which pushes him down even more. It is almost like he can feel what Thancred needs, is adjusting accordingly and giving him just enough to drive him further into madness. Hells, Thancred thinks wildly, perhaps he is. Perhaps it’s some strange monk trick—or some strange _Ikael_ trick—and this entire experience is being tailored _just_ to perfection for Thancred. He would not put it beyond him.

Ikael is… keeping a fast, constant pace, not faltering for even but a moment. It would make Thancred wonder, were he of a mind, how much truth there is to his words that a lack of sensation on the giver’s end leads to a better experience for the receiver. Purely subjective, perhaps, but Thancred hasn’t been… taken like this in _years_ , let alone the last time he did it.

Ikael’s chest pressed to his back is all heat, close enough that Thancred can feel him breathe, can feel his sweat. One hand is pressed into his back, five pinpricks of pleasured pain on his skin, and the other—somehow wedges itself underneath them, wraps around Thancred's cock as he is fucked into its grip. It is all too much, more than Thancred ever expected from this.

“Kael—I—ah—” Thancred can feel the familiar climb of pleasure from deep inside him. Ikael hisses, a gut reaction of either displeasure or acknowledgement, and his thrusts speed up; a distinct, measured change in pace.

Thancred comes with a low cry, hips jerking and stuttering into both the phallus inside him and the hand around him. _All onto his bedsheets_ , he thinks hazily, not finding enough of himself to be distraught. Ikael keeps moving, groaning softly, only slows down and stills when Thancred does.

Then he is gently getting off of him, his warmth leaving and pulling out. Thancred makes some sort of instinctual grunt at that, collapsing. He dimly registers a dull thump on the floor near him, and then Ikael is back.

“Move out of the puddle of spend, hm?” Ikael pushes at him gently, cooing. Thancred groans, exhausted, and lets himself be rolled onto his side. He feels an abrupt tug, and flops a little to help as Ikael yanks the top sheet off the bed, balls it, and throws it aside.

“We’ll wash that later,” he says, laying down next to Thancred and finally moving closer to him. Thancred makes a soft noise and reaches for him, pulling him close. Ikael coos again, still gentle. He curls up against Thancred.

A few minutes later, Thancred realizes what his shorted-out brain is trying to tell him. He blinks at Ikael, lethargically urgent. “You didn’t…”

Ikael tilts his head, looking at him. Then he chuckles quietly.

“No,” he confirms through a smile. He leans forward to give Thancred a kiss. “But that is alright. I do not have to, yeah? The experience itself is what matters, not the count of orgasms.”

 _Ikael_ is giving _Thancred_ the “it’s the experience that matters” talk. He cannot believe this. He shakes his head, drawing his hand down Ikael’s body. Ikael furrows his brow at him in some concern, but does not stop him.

“I want to,” Thancred murmurs, pressing his hand to Ikael’s sex as his legs fall open. He slowly kisses along his neck, unhurried, the bliss still lingering in his touch. “Please.”

“Y-yeah, I’m not… trying to stop you,” Ikael mumbles. He is breathing fast again, the dear. Thancred's hand meet hot, soaked softness, and he purrs, moving his fingers in a familiar rhythm.

Ikael’s cheeks are tinged with arousal, his eyes are gazing, jittering—Thancred kisses him before he can think, drawing out his pleasure in slow, gradual sweeps, lingering when he can. It is not long before Ikael whimpers and shakes, and Thancred smiles in smug satisfaction before slowing to a stop with his hand still pressed to Ikael’s sex, resting there.

“Add me to your ledger,” Ikael says after a minute of just their breaths and their heartbeats. “‘Ikael “Kael” Jelaar: three times on average. Fast recovery time.’”

Thancred takes a moment to piece that together. His eyebrows shoot up. “On average?” he says. “We have slept together _twice_.”

“The average definitely has room for adjustment,” says Ikael, stroking some path down Thancred's arm that he cannot see. Thancred gazes at him. “I think we can shoot for… hm. Are we speaking per bell? I managed fourteen, once.”

“Fourteen.” Thancred stares at him incredulously.

Ikael shrugs. “Had a dry spell.”

“You _timed_ yourself,” Thancred continues.

Ikael squints, then pouts, and sticks out his tongue. Thancred laughs lowly, pulling him closer until he can settle a hand in his hair, rub at his ears.

“I’m sure we can shoot for fifteen,” he murmurs, earning him a tired giggle. Speaking of which… “Oh! That reminds me. And pray tell me if I am being impertinent, but—you have a clitoris _and_ a prostrate. How does that work, exactly?”

Ikael stares at him.

“I have a what?” he says.

Thancred's mouth opens and closes. Right—he is talking to someone who never received a formal education. Ah, well. As long as he knows what they’re for, the terms don’t really matter, anyways. And hopefully, Thancred will have _plenty_ of time to… discover… as much of Ikael as he can.

“If you’re going to say unsexy scientific words during sex, please try and refrain.” Ikael is speaking over his thoughts. “I will allow anything up to five letters, but after that it just kills the mood, yeah? Although if you say ‘penis,’ then I will have to stop sleeping with you forever and run away, bec—”

Thancred cuts him off with a deep kiss. Ikael sighs softly, reaching up to cradle his head. The kiss breaks slowly, and Ikael nuzzles Thancred’s cheek, pressing his lips to his skin and making a soft, nearly inaudible noise. Thancred closes his eyes, resting his forehead against Ikael’s. He manages to contain his smile until he speaks.

“Penis,” he mutters under his breath, and then absolutely loses himself in a fit of giggles.

~*~

**Author's Note:**

> again, this is most definitely an AU of ikael's main verse. but if you have a request (i was. doing a jokey) or wanna say hi, i'm draw-you-coward on tumblr :>


End file.
